Customer Reviews

The Bankers: The Next Generation The New Worlds Money Credit Banking Electronic Age (Truman Talley)

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

The financial services industry has always been something of an enigma to me. After reading THE BANKERS, it still is. Perhaps the lush reviews garnered by this book instilled unrealistic expectations: I expected a carefully researched, scholarly treatment of the banking business past-to-present. For better or worse, this book reads more like a quirky monologue by someone who knows the banking business well, but who prefers to deliver his knowledge by free association rather than by cogent and orderly description. The anecdotes are sometimes very entertaining, and the reader does pick up some valuable insights. But the return on effort extended is less than excellent. What's especially ironic is the book's chapters ARE cogently organized...it's only the follow-through that's lacking.

The book's high point is Chapter 3 (Paying Bills). Here the author does an admirable job of describing the excruciatingly convoluted process of check clearance. It would seem to be the dullest subject imaginable, but Mayer brings it to life -and I suspect he does such an admirable job because he has a flair for showing the quirkiness in any subject under the sun. The biggest disappointment of the book is how Mayer is compelled to entangle his journalistic prominence with whatever other point he wants to make ("A team of television journalists came from a Japanese network to visit me in Washington..."). Once again, there are some terrific insights, and some entertaining one-liners. It's just that the perspective one receives seems indulgently biased, and not particularly comprehensive.

The scope of this book is fantastic. I wanted to enjoy it, but Mayer plays too fast & loose with the facts. His descriptions of banking principles is muddy, leaving me to wonder if he's a sloppy writer, a bad economist, or so presumptuous to think his readers all have finance PhD's and don't need clear explanations. Among his factual errors: He mistakenly put Citicorp's card processing center in Fargo, North Dakota (instead of Sioux Falls, SD) and Reno. First Chicago was bought by National Australia Bank; it did not merge with Michigan National. Midlantic was bought by PNC, not City National of Cleveland. What happened to editors?

I run with a crowd of i-bankers, and I bought this book to try to better understand what they do all day. However, this book is a LOT of history, and the entire first Part of the book is VERY basic information relating to what "money" is.

If you learn well through anecdotes, you will find this book both informative and easy to read. If, on the other hand, you are considering this book thinking it will be information about the modern banking industry given in a straightforward way, you're out of luck. In order to understand the industry (or what pieces of it this book explores, anyway) you have to extrapolate larger themes from nearly 500 pages of amost exclusively history and anecdotal examples. In addition, Martin has a habit of describing people in the industry, e.g., "Mr. X, a swarthy fellow I knew while still a fencer at Penn and something of a womanizer besides..." For some, I'm sure this keeps the book from being too dry. I, on the other hand, found these descriptions annoying and diversionary.

In sum, if you're looking for information about the modern banking industry, just read chapters nine and ten, which are well-written, relatively complete, and exceptionally easy to understand. If, instead, you are looking for the story of how banking has evolved, or you just like to read businessmen's tales, then this is the book for you.

A very readable book for just about anyone interested in money, banking, financial risk management, and electronic methods of payment - although I'd imagine that professional bankers and money managers would find much of the information and ideas presented to be "old hat". Speaking as a former corporate financial executive with relatively little treasury experience, I found the book both entertaining and informative. If you have any questions, please feel free to email me - adamleft@webspan.net.

First I believe this book should be a ten star. I am a crinimal justice major @ I.U. and also a victim of white collar crime. I have read three other books written by Mayer and have found them all useful for an independent study that I am doing on banking crime by insiders. I fell that if a person wanted to ask a banking question and get an educated answer Mayer is the person to ask.

Comprehensive and insightful, the author has painted a clear landscape of the role of money in the computer age. Touching on several key issues such as the Savings and Loan scandal and the decision-making of federal regulators, he has given the reader an edge with the tools needed to skillfully and confidently debate the shape of things to come in the banking industry

This is the first and only book I've ever read on banking. But it is very well written, clear, concise, and filled with interesting bits of history. The author shows extreme mastery of the topic. If you read any book about the industry, this should be it.

Martin Mayer's book, The Bankers, has served as a basic text for an introduction to banking in the United States for over twenty years. Required reading in this author's Law School the 1975 edition of Mayer's book provided a clear and insightful overview into the banking system before plunging into the Banking Law coarse offered by the school.

Twenty years later the new edition of this book reads like a a new book even to those readers who have read previous editions. So much new material has been added one scarcely finds any familiarity with prior edtions of the book. This is a sign of the immense changes that have occurred in the economy of the nation and the world over the last twenty years. In this respect a new edition of the book was long over due.

Mayer's writing style is such that it draws the reader into a complex subject and walks you around briefly until the reader is familiar with the jargon and then leads you to his particular point easily. In this way the new edition retains all the original value of the prior editions as a primer on banking procedures for a wide audience of readers.

Nonetheless, there were times during the reading of the new edition that this author wished we could have spent more time on particular subjects to thoroughly answer all questions on that subject before moving on to the next topic. This author is still looking for a more comprehensive explanation of the role of cash cards and ATMs in the economy as a whole. Perhaps we will have to wait until the next editions of this book to be published.

Brian W.Wells
Attorney at Law
Charleston, West Virginia

Martin Mayer gives the reader a very thorough and insightful perspective of today's financial industry. A must read for everyone who wants to be up to date in the financial services industry, its risks, challenges and disasters, it equally well serves the outsider. Mayer's writing is full of anecdotal accounts of recent events in banking, making this a very pleasant read. His authority in the field is quite obvious and the picture that he paints of current developments in banking leaves plenty food for thought

Martin Mayer is the guru of the past, present and future of banking. This book begins by explaining the nature of money and the purpose of banking, gives an insightful look into the history of banking and provides a vivid image of where banking is going. Mayer is an excellent writer and storyteller and his passion for the subject is contagious. Orman Anderson Wharton MBA 98